Hi everyone!
A short introduction of myself: I am a mother of two / a maternity store
owner / a childbirth educator and a natural birth activist from Finland. I
have been reading Andrea Robertson's books and diary for a while and got a
lot of help from her company in organising a new consept of childbirth
preparation in Finland. Now I decided to follow this list for a while.
In Finland childbirth is pretty medicalized, even though it is the midwives
providing the care ( in doctor's supervision). I have now started a 7 week
program for mothers and farthers to be, trying to educate them about the
normal physiology of birth and the enermous inner strength and ability, that
they have within their bodies. I am working together with couple of
midwifes. Natural Childbirth is considered very "hippy" over here and is
very very rare. Mothers don't generally feel a need for any preparation and
the trust for the health care system is great. The first group, that I just
finished a moth ago was a succes, some of the fathers especially said how
sceptical they were to attend this course, but everyone was extremely happy
in the end and felt sorry for all others, that were not attending. I think I
have started something great, and hopefully it will grow into something big
and the happy moms and dads will spread the word and more and more parents
will find out about their options for a better birth. I am also educating
all my sales people in the store about natural childbirth and breastfeeding,
so they can even give advise in the store if the subject comes up with the
moms.
The discussion about the induction and the doctor going away for a holiday
got me thinking how bad we really have things over here... In Finland you do
your prenatal visits at the "neuvola", where the nurse will see you until
your birth. Some of the nurses have no practical knowlege of pregnancy and
birth and quite often give unaccurate information for moms. But the
"neuvola" service is well respected, and if they advice to start
bottlefeeding for example, there is no reason to doubt this... We don't have
a single Birthing Centre here, and homebirth is almost nonexistent (only
ab.10-30 births a year). No expences are covered for a homebirth and it is
hard to find a midwife for the job. The maternity hospital, which is
considered closest to the midwifery model of care has ARM 32%, oxytocin 53%,
episiotomy 14%, epidural 25%. So, the moms, that I am trying to educate
don't really have a lot of choice here. They choose between couple of very
similar hospitals, that's about how much they can do. When the labor starts,
they will go to the hospital, and which ever midwife will be on shift will
care for them. Often they will be cared by 3-4 midwifes until the baby is
born. Sometimes it feels almost unfair to educate and train these moms for a
natural birth, when you know what is waiting for them in the hospital. I am
dreaming of opening a birth centre here in the future.
Paivi
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